Should you get it? We discuss it on our PayDay The Heist Review
A game that lets you rob a bank? Bring it on. PayDay The Heist is the first game from Overkill Software. Featuring a similar formula to the Left 4 Dead series, the game puts you in charge of completing challenging heists cooperatively with up to three friends or solo with the help of three bots. The overall package is a fun and a welcome addition to the PlayStation Network and PC.
Each of the six missions is an homage to a variety of Hollywood (and real life) robberies, ranging from diamond heists atop skyscrapers to complex bank robberies to a particularly audacious caper where you air-lift an armored safe room via helicopter. Tackling these heists alone with AI friend is fun, but tackling them with real friends...awesome. Coordinating your moves with your friend using the headset it's an unique experience. The objective changes from mission to mission. In one mission you must fight your way through a bridge to cut loose a prisoner using saws to cut armored trucks down, in another one you must place explosives to blow up a room so a helicopter can lift up the whole vault full of money. The setpieces are really awesome to see and also take part in.
The player can choose from one of four characters which all looks like the Joker's heist gang from The Dark Knight. The game features a n upgrade system that's not easy to understand. But I was lucky enough that one developer from Overkill explained the system to me. So the leveling system has three different trees: Assault, Sharpshooter and Support. Your character evolves as you play and that tweaks the game's various heists. Each time you level up, you unlock a new weapon, item or bonus from the experience tree you have active. You can switch , at any time, between these trees using the select button. There are 145 levels or reputation to reach. By the time you reach the max reputation, you became unstoppable.
As soon as you start the game, you have 2 weapons, an assault rifle and a silence pistol. You also have cable ties to tie hostages down and an ammo bag. Leveling up you unlock new weapons, new items like body armor or doctor bag that heals you very fast. The first wave of the enemies are easy, as you fight guards and policeman. But then the whole hell breaks loose into you. SWAT teams using body armor, assault rifles and shotguns comes directly at you. They throw smoke grenades to cover them as they fire mags after mags. Snipers shoot you from long distances. Then special forces, that looks like Sam Fisher, comes at you. But none of them are as deadly as the "Bulldozer". If you hear that "bulldozer" is coming, run. He is a juggernaut type policeman, that needs a lot of firepower to bring down. If an enemy shoots you down, your teammates gave like 30 seconds to help you get up. If the don't help you, you may respawn after some minutes or you can be exchanged for a hostage.
Matchmaking in this game is a bit of a problem. Finding an online match takes a lot of time. Even when you find one, even if the lobby appears available, it's probably full. I don't know why that happens. Also another problem, or more of a nuisance, is that if a new player wants to join the lobby while you are playing, the whole game stops and starts again after he is in...
The frame rate is stable, with a few hiccups here and there. I love how the game looks. The environments are really detailed. Also the enemies and the gang looks really good. But there's some clipping and stiff animations. The techno music creates an intense atmosphere that really fits the theme, Heists.
Payday: The Heist hits the spot. It's a fun shooter that works both solo and in multiplayer, packing an incredible amount of excitement and tension into what is really a simple concept. For 20 $ you get a large amount of content. Definitely give this game a try.
8.5/10
